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GasBuddy.com petroleum analyst Dan McTeague said there are several factors causing the increase, including an increase in the price of oil from $62 to $67 per barrel and cold temperatures across Canada causing refineries to run their spring maintenance later than usual.

“It looks like at least one, perhaps two of the refineries here in Edmonton are going through a form of springtime maintenance,” McTeague said. “That means some of their production and their units are offline and may be so for the next several weeks.”

McTeague said the Chicago market is also an important factor in determining gas prices across Western Canada because that’s where the benchmark is set for prices. And Chicago has experienced a 10 to 11 cent per gallon increase over the past nine to 10 days.

“When prices go up or down there based on economics there, representing a population probably 10 times our size from Ohio in the east all the way to the Rockies in the west, that really has a direct impact on the price we pay out of Edmonton,” he said.

“I point out that those wholesale prices is a result of what’s happened in Chicago … [where prices] have gone up about four cents a litre just in the past week alone.”